Authors: Jade Allen
Ava's head filled
with naughty images of the delectable cowboy, wondering if he was as skilled in
other areas as he appeared to be in training horses and aspiring, young horse
trainers. Perhaps a week at the ranch wouldn't be such a horrible experience
now. With eye candy like that, who cares about mucking out barns or chasing
away chickens. She'd do it all happily if she could keep that talented cowboy
in her sights. Maybe she should make the suggestion to the owner—he'd have a
whole lot more guests on the ranch. Hell, women would flock in hordes to watch
that man at work. Ava had always figured herself to be the kind of girl who
would go crazy over a hot fireman or sexy policeman, but she couldn't imagine
any one of them—or even a whole group of them—holding a candle to this guy.
He looked up then,
glancing in her direction. His eyes found her, grazing over her body from head
to toe. It was an incredibly bold move, given that he knew she could see him,
and Ava couldn't help but wonder if the sexy cowboy was more cocky or
confident. At the same time, she could feel heat begin to creep into her cheeks
and she nearly laughed aloud; she was blushing like an inexperienced school girl!
“Great,” she thought
wryly. “Next, he'll have me tongue-tied and giggling like a teenager, too.”
He turned away a
moment later, the young horse trainer garnering his attention. Ava turned away,
too, heading back into the cabin, still smiling over her silly, adolescent
response to the sexy wrangler. Christie was there, all ready to head up to the
house for lunch with Will, and by the time they walked back outside the cabin,
the wrangler was gone; only the boy and the horse remained in the training pen and
he was nowhere in sight.
“Am I imagining
things?” she thought half-humorously, wondering if perhaps the country air was
messing with her head and she'd imagined the too-hot-to-be-real cowboy.
Wandering up to the
house, the door was open for them before they reached the top of the front
porch, Will already standing there beyond the threshold.
“Come on in,” he
welcomed them, leading them to the oversized dining room beyond the front
foyer. “This is Noah. He's um...a wrangler here,” Will motioned to the man
walking into the room from the opposite direction.
“Oh, thank God,” Ava
thought silently. It wasn't only that she got to see the sexy wrangler
again—sure, it was a nice perk—but his presence there confirmed that she wasn't
losing her marbles.
“You joining us for
lunch, Noah? I'm sure these fine ladies wouldn't object to your company,” Will
offered, the light of an ever-ready matchmaker gleaming in his eyes.
Noah was silent for
just a moment, his eyes grazing over Ava just as they had outside of the cabin.
He spoke to Will without turning to look at him. “I really wish I could, Will.
Unfortunately, I need to get a few hours in if I'm going to see what I can do
with the new arrival later on.” His eyes stayed fixed on Ava as he spoke, and
while she had no idea what he was talking about, it seemed to her there was a
double innuendo in his words. And if she was the “new arrival,” she'd love to
find out what he could do with her, too.
He left then and the
remaining occupants of the room sat down at the table as a plump, middle-aged
woman brought in a giant tray, laden with food that smelled a thousand times
better than anything Ava or her roommates could whip up in between classes.
Will chattered on
about life on the ranch as they ate, and Ava had to admit that it sounded a
little more interesting than she had originally thought—at least it didn't seem
that he spent all his time knee-deep in...less appealing aspects of the job. He
offered to take them out to the training pen after lunch to see a wrangler in action,
but as they strolled over to the fence, she experienced a small wave of
disappointment, hoping it would have been the sexy wrangler from earlier
working with the horse. Instead, Will introduced them to John, an experienced
cowboy who'd been working on the ranch for decades. He held a long rope in his
hand, attached to the horse's bridle, and he spoke loudly but calmly to the
docile creature, leading it around the pen. Though he never used it, the man
held a whip draped over one arm, and Ava covered her mouth aghast when she
first saw it. Will was quick to explain that the whip was never used to harm or
discipline the horse. The pressure exerted was only ever enough to express to
the horse how it should move. Ava wasn't entirely convinced; she couldn't help
but wonder if there wasn't a better way to train the horse.
The rest of the day
passed by in a hurry, Christie pulling Ava along to one area of the ranch or
another. As the two returned to the cabin long after night had fallen, Christie
headed for bed while Ava opted to indulge her tired legs in a relaxing dip in
the hot tub. Turning on the jets, she climbed in, and instantly she could feel
the luxurious heat of the water soothing her muscles. Closing her eyes, she
leaned back as images of the sexy wrangler sprang to her mind. “Oh no you
don't,” she chastised herself. This was intended to be a relaxing bath, not a
stimulating one, and given that her vibrator was miles away back at home, sexy
men and naughty sex needed to be the furthest things from her mind.
Stepping out of the
tub, she wrapped a towel around her and tiptoed to her bedroom in search of
clothing. It was too warm for a bathrobe, so she opted for a strapless, azure
blue sundress instead with an A-line fit and a hem that fell to mid-thigh. Now
too revved up for sleep, she walked out onto the front porch, the lights from
the training pen catching her attention immediately.
“Damn,” she breathed,
relinquishing all hope that her mind and body might settle down. “Out of the
hot tub and into the fire,” she mocked herself dryly.
The sexy cowboy was
there with a different horse than the one she'd seen him and the young trainer
with earlier that day. He had ditched the cowboy hat, no longer needing it to
shield his eyes from the sun, and she could see that his hair was dark, left
just long enough that it added to his rugged appeal.
The horse was larger
than the one from earlier and jet black without a single marking anywhere on
its body. Its head was lowered slightly, waving back and forth from side to
side, and its ears appeared pinned back, near his neck. It pawed the ground
with his foreleg forcefully, and although Ava had no experience with horses,
its body spoke volumes in a language that even she could understand. The horse
was nervous, angry, untamed, and there was no one else there for it to vent its
aggression on but the cowboy.
It wasn't wearing a
bridle or saddle, and the cowboy had no whip like the man she'd seen earlier.
Noah appeared to have absolutely no way to get the horse under control but he
also wasn't moving out of its way. Ava's pulse sped up, her breath catching in
her throat. Instead of retreating, the man moved in closer, meeting the horse's
gaze directly and speaking to it in hushed tones. Slowly, the animal's head
stilled, its ears turned forward and slowly, it ceased pawing at the ground.
The cowboy continued to speak quietly, his hand coming up to touch the side of
the horse's head. He held his hand still for a moment and then stroked the
horse gently.
Ava hadn't realized she'd
been moving forward until then, down the steps of the front porch and halfway
across the distance that had been between them. She stopped, watching,
mesmerized by the way the man calmed the wild animal. It was breathtaking. He
moved along the length of the horse, talking all the while, and then steered
the horse's direction with a single, firm push. It began to follow his
rudimentary commands, obeying the cowboy, moving around the pen. He stopped
each time the horse seemed to be getting riled up, calming him with only his
hands and voice. Ava didn't know how long he continued; it could have been
seconds or hours, she really wasn't sure. The cowboy stopped then, reaching for
a bridle slung over the fence. Approaching the horse slowly, he fit it into place,
though the horse began to paw at the ground lightly, increasing Ava's heart
rate once again. But, as soon as the cowboy was finished, the pawing stopped.
Stroking the horse's
head with one hand, he reached into a container behind him, retrieving a handful
of apple slices and feeding them to the horse one at a time. Patting the horse
for a job well done, he turned then, spotting Ava right away. He looked at her
for a moment, his hand moving to calm the horse who had begun to paw nervously
again, noticing Ava's presence. As the pawing ceased, the cowboy started over
toward her, and although she hadn't the slightest idea what to say—a rare
occurrence for Ava—she moved forward, slowly closing the distance between them.
“He's brand new
here,” the cowboy spoke, saving Ava from having to delve deep for some witty
remark. “I bought him from a man who was going to make him into a gelding,
thinking he was too unruly to ever be manageable.”
“But, you were able
to train him,” she replied, disturbed by the thought of such an atrocity over
an animal's natural behavior.
He smiled then, “Not
exactly. He'll let me near him, sure, and he'll even follow a command or two,
but it will be a while before he's letting me ride him without bucking me off
every chance he gets.”
“How did you do it? I
mean, Will was explaining how it works earlier, and there were ropes and
whips...”
“I just do things a
little differently. The trick is to start off fully knowing the horse will
respond, instead of trying to convince him to. He recognizes that. He trusts
that you know what you're doing,” he said simply, opening the pen's gate and
stepping out, closing it firmly behind him. “It's like walking into a room full
of toddlers; you have to know you've got everything under control or they'll walk,
run, skip, hop and jump all over you.”
“Come on,” he
motioned for Ava to follow. “I'll show you.”
“Sure thing,” she
replied aloud. “But I bet you've got other tricks I'd love for you to show me,”
she added silently. Though, she was genuinely interested in how the cowboy
managed to control a horse so easily.
“You haven't spent
much time around horses,” he surmised accurately.
“No, not once before
today actually. I thought I was a city girl through-and-through, but I'm
enjoying it here much more than I thought I would.” “Of course, the sexy
scenery doesn't hurt,” she mused wordlessly.
He led her beyond the
barn to another corral, stopping briefly to ask a young man in the barn to
bring out a particular horse. He opened the pen gate, motioning for Ava to step
inside, and she did so nervously, not certain she wanted to come face to face
with a wild animal like the one in the other pen. A moment later though, she
breathed a small sigh of relief, the young man leading a much smaller, more
docile-looking horse into the pen.
Noah removed the
horse's reins, patting its head and speaking quietly once again. He started
moving then, signaling for the horse to follow—and it did. He stopped and the
horse came to a halt.
“Come here,” he told
her, and she complied, feeling a bit like the obedient horse for a second.
Taking her hand, he
guided her fingers to the horse as a tremor of desire surged up her arm in
response to his touch. He continued to guide her, stroking along the horse's
head, and Ava did her best to focus on the task at hand instead of the cowboy's
body, so close to her own. He released her hand then and she nearly sighed in
disappointment, reining in her response at the last second. She continued to
stroke the horse, surprised by the sleek, soft feel.
“Now, tell her what
you want her to do,” he told Ava, moving directly behind her.
“I'd love to tell you
what I want you do to,” Ava spoke, realizing too late that she'd spoken aloud,
heat creeping into her cheeks once again.
“I'd love to hear
what it is you want me to do,” he responded easily, his voice huskier, just a
hair's breadth from her ear. “But first, we should finish with Maggie, or she
might feel jilted, coming out here for nothing,” he continued, but he was
suddenly even closer than before, his lips lingering close to her ear while she
could feel the heat radiating from his body, now less than an inch away from
hers.
She nodded, grateful
the cowboy couldn't see her face at the moment, giving her a chance to regain
her composure. “I want her to follow me,” Ava told him, turning her head as she
spoke, finding his eyes bright with desire.
Taking her hand, Noah
showed her the command she'd need and then stood back just a step to let Ava
take the helm. Feeling a little silly, she stood tall, summoning all the
confidence she had, and motioned to the horse. Maggie started toward her
instantly and Ava smiled, taking a step back to start moving around the pen.
“Um, how do I tell
her to stop,” Ava asked the second time around the pen, realizing that they
might continue around in circles all night otherwise, Maggie appearing
perfectly content to follow Ava's movements.
Noah showed her from
where he stood, leaning against the fence, watching her from the other side of
the pen. She motioned for Maggie to stop and the horse complied instantly. Ava
reached out her hand automatically, stroking the animal's smooth head, pleased
with their mutual accomplishment.
“That was amazing!”
she beamed, having had no idea that working with a horse could be so
enthralling. Though, it didn't hurt that the trainer could have been
GQ
’s
sexiest man of the year.
“Yes, you were,” Noah
commented huskily, the combination of Ava's enthusiasm and her feminine curves
driving him crazy.
Since he'd started
helping Will out, he'd made it a policy to keep his distance from the newcomers
vacationing on the ranch. They'd show up usually more interested in bashing
country living than learning about it, sticking up their noses at any task or
ranch hand they felt was beneath them. Unfortunately, it usually didn't take
them long to figure out who he was though, and then he was stuck fending off
every uppity young gold-digger throughout the entire duration of their stay.
But, there was something different about Ava, and he just couldn't help himself.